Seetak
'''Seetak, '''known before the Great War as the '''Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, '''is the largest settlement in the ruins of Seattle. Essentially an entire city unto itself, the community is divided among a number of different groups that manage to co-exist with one another despite their often disparate goals and philosophies. History Temporary departure delay Seattle-Tacoma Airport survived the Great Wart unscathed, having either not been targeted or, alternatively, not been hit by any weapons directed at it. Instead, its first loss came during the initial attacks as an Inversion Layer airlines flight that was on approach suffered a full systems failure as a result of nearby nuclear detonations. The aircraft crashed into the main runway, breaking up and bursting into flames. While emergency crews did their best to contain the fire, the result was that attention was focused on the runway and rather then the burning city around the airport. Even as a huge plume of black smoke was billowing out from the center of the airport, it was besieged by desperate people hoping to somehow get out of the city. Never mind that all flights were grounded and that air traffic control didn’t have any contact with anyone, those inside the terminals were desperate to get on board whatever flights were available, while those outside the airport were clawing to get inside so they could also join the throngs. The airport’s security staff tried to maintain order, but were quickly overwhelmed. Into the fray stepped the army, as both regular units and the National Guard were deployed to maintain order in the airport and hold it as a strategic location. Colonel Jeff Haize, the senior officer in charge, had no idea of the situation outside of Seattle himself, however he saw the airport as a vital link in maintaining communications and preparing for a possible Chinese invasion or alternatively a counterattack. On the afternoon of the 23rd of October, Haize’s forces, including tanks, IFVs, Power Armor and conventional infantry, poured into the airport and took control of it. Seeing a potential threat, he ordered his troops to open fire on the oncoming desperate hoards in order to disperse them and turn them back from the airport. The result was a considerable escalation of the violence; while at the end of the day, the Army was in control of the airport, there were considerable civilian casualties while several buildings (and a couple of grounded planes) had burned. Having secured the facility, Haize did his best to sit tight in expectation of a Chinese invasion or a counter-attack, both of which he felt were inevitable. Instead, days stretched out into weeks and then months with no word at all from outside, leaving Haize with no idea as to the bigger picture. And while his forces continued to sit tight at the airport, Seattle burned around them as the city descended into chaos and violence. Careful rationing of food, water and anti-radiation medication allowed them to maintain their cohesion while also keeping the majority of the civilians alive. While they were able to deal with the occasional looter, the biggest threat to Haize’s forces turned out to be the environment. The harsh winter of 2077-78 blanketed the airport in snow, which Haize saw as a threat to their operations. He had men out clearing the runways in preparation for relief flights that were never going to come, going to the point of forcing civilians to work in the freezing cold at gunpoint. As the winter worsened, supplies began to run out, forcing Haize to order ‘resource gathering expeditions’ into the surrounding city. In truth little more then organised looting sprees, these missions ran afoul of far stronger opposition than expected from the desperate people of Seattle. And while they did sometimes return with supplies, any also suffered losses or came back empty-handed. Haize was forced to institute ever increasingly harsh rationing, but this proved to be just a band-aid measure that was, to many, just prolonging the inevitable. By February of 2078, it was obvious that nobody was coming; it had now been four months since the Great War and there had not been any contact with the airport at all. Morale was plummeting and people were starving, while Haize continued to cling to the idea that the airport was vital. (Isolated contact with Liberator drones was used to prove his point) Many saw him becoming ever increasingly delusional and paranoid and unable to accept the reality of the situation. Above all else, winter was showing no signs of ending anytime soon, leaving everyone doomed to starve to death following a madman’s orders. While there had allways been a problem with desertions, the degenerating situation combined with the improving weather in March of 2078 saw a massive uptick in their occurrence. While the airport offered shelter, many of the civilians there felt they could no longer take Haize’s mania and paranoia as well as the pointless forced labour. Among the millitary, at first there were those who were willing to turn a blind eye to what was going on and let them leave. As the trickle became a flood, Haize ordered his men to shoot any deserters on sight. Instead, this only spurned his men on to also desert, with many feeling Haize was no longer fit to command and that his cause was pointless. Those that left usually chose to avoid Seattle itself. They either fled south, hoping to move to warmer climates, or east towards the mountains, looking for shelter and a way out of the city (Which in and of itself was in the process of depopulating as the population died off or fled). By the middle of the year, the goal was no longer to escape Haize in specific but rather he city in general. By that point, the airport was a ghost town, occupied largely by a small core of loyalists and those two ill, infirm or afraid to leave. Haize himself stuck to his guns and remained in the airport until the end. He died inside the control tower, still waiting for a message that would never come. * Pre-war hub for Jet and other chem smuggling * Taken over by US Army immediately after the war * They eventually coallpse * Private army to keep the peace * The good and bad parts of town * Any slavers are castrated, shot and then politely asked to leave * Terminal district - where the rich peple live * Fat Yaks - Japanese-American criminals * Pink Mohawks - officially licenced raiders * Underground - live in the bowels of the airport; eg baggage handling Category:Communities Category:Places Category:Cascadia